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Design Challenge 1 (~_^)

we are focusing on vegetables

#unbelievable #stunlikevegetables

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Design Challenge 1: How might we encourage communities to support local produce?

Focusing on General Produce which involves Vegetables, Fruits, Live Stock, etc.

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Interviewing and Shadowing

Both are Qualitative Methods, so we can gain more detailed insights into Singaporeans' Perspectives of Local Produce.

Interviewing and shadowing are both methods used in qualitative research to gather data about people's experiences, behaviors, and attitudes.

Interviews are a way to gather information from people through direct questioning. They can be structured, with a set list of questions, or unstructured, with more open-ended questions. Interviews can be conducted in person, over the phone, or online.

Shadowing is a method of observing people in their natural setting. It involves following a person or group of people as they go about their daily activities, in order to gain insight into their behavior and experiences. Shadowing can be done in person, online or in the field.

Both interviewing and shadowing can provide rich and detailed data about people's experiences and perspectives. They can be used together or separately depending on the research question and the context of the study.

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Do you usually purchase locally grown vegetables or imported vegetables? Why?

How do you determine where to purchase your vegetables from?

Have you noticed a difference in the quality or taste of locally grown vegetables compared to imported vegetables?

How do you feel about the prices of locally grown vegetables compared to imported vegetables?

Are there any challenges or barriers you face when trying to buy locally grown vegetables?

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To encourage communities to support and buy Local Vegetables #onesingapore #strongertogether #unitedasone

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Design Challenge 1: Vegetables

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Interviews : Structured Interview

We decided on structured interview as we feel that by coming up with a set of questions to ask the interviewees, we ensure that we do not miss out on any essential data that we want to gain and look into, allowing us to gain better insights. It also allows us to keep track and ensure that we gain sufficient data for each question for analysis. A structured interview also provides us with a flow so that we can conduct the interview smoothly. By conducting an interview, which is a qualitative research method, we are able to gain more detailed responses as we have the ability to probe the participant.

We will focus on the target demographic's opinion on local produce.

Target Participants:

Singaporeans

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Research Goal: To find out about locals’ understanding, perspectives and habits towards purchasing local produce.

Project Goal: To encourage people to purchase local produce to boost food security

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Current Methods (used to address challenges)

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Current Methods (used to address challenges)

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Education: Raise awareness through posters put up in institutions, competitions

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How might we encourage communities to support local produce?

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Objective: To learn more about the Singaporeans' perspective on locally grown produce.

Things to Find Out: Participant's pre-existing thoughts on local livestock/veggies/fisheries, Usual source of produce (local/imported), Level of preference for local against imported produce, Obstacles when wanting to purchase local produce, Expected improvements to make local produce more accessible.

Target Participants: Singaporean residents

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Current Method 1 (Certification Scheme Logos)

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Current Method 1 (Certification Scheme Logos)

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Consumers can easily identify the logo on the product's packaging and may be more encouraged to buy the produce as there is quality assurance. It also promotes awareness of the local produce and encourages users to support it.

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Current Method 2 (Singapore Good Food Guide)

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Current Method 2 (Singapore Good Food Guide)

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Another method used to promote local produce in Singapore. One is the Singapore Good Food Guide, which ranks local produce and provides information on where to buy it. Additionally, the Singapore government has also provided grants to support local farmers and promote the consumption of local produce.

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How might we, as designers, create spaces and experiences for diverse individuals and communities to interact and engage with each other meaningfully?

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Another method used to promote local produce in Singapore is local urban farming.  Singapore agencies has promoted urban farming in the HDB building that we are living in and getting all the residents of the building to join in this project. Through this project, they sell local planted and produced product from these farms to local citizens, supermarkets, etc, at a low market price. Which receives large supports from these consumers.

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Current Method 1: to a certain extent, it actually helps consumers identify that the product is of local produce.

Current Method 2: indeed effective, as they help to increase the visibility of local produce and make it easier for consumers to access it. the Good Food Guide provides an easy way for consumers to identify local produce and the Farmers' Market gives them a direct way to purchase such products. the government grants also encourage farmers to produce more local produce, thereby increasing the supply and availability of local produce.

Current Method 3: is quite effective, as they allow the residents to learn more about the different process of how local farming product works and raise awareness of locally farmed products. this allows them to be more aware and more educated in terms of locally produced products and will not be discriminated against just because the food that they consume is locally produced.

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Interview:
We want to interview the visitors of supermarkets o understand their experiences with buying local produce. Interviews would allow us to get more qualitative responses from our participants.

We have chosen to do specifically a semi-structured interview as this would allow use some level of flexibility to ask questions according to the participant’s responses. Interviews would also allow us to obtain insights to find out what improvements we can make from there as well.

Survey:
We want to conduct surveys with visitors of supermarkets, to find out if they buy local produce.

Since it is a quantitative research method, we want to obtain information describing of a large sample of different visitors who visits supermarket. It is more towards demographics and their feedback as a consumer.

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Events held at local farms to spread awareness:

Effectiveness:
I think that it is effective in showing consumers how the local produce in farms are actually grown and this will allow people to have an indept understanding and its process and this can help them to trust local produce better and purchase them.

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To understand consumer behaviour in buying local produce.
To create awareness of local produce and its benefits for Singapore.
To encourage more consumers to choose local produce over imported produce.

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A multi-disciplinary team is composed of members from different disciplines and backgrounds who work together to achieve a common goal. This can include members from different departments, industries, or skill sets in order to bring a variety of perspectives and expertise to the project.

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SFA partners with the Singapore Agro-Food Enterprises Federation Limited (SAFEF) to organise the SG Farmers' Market (SGFM) at various community spaces and online via Lazada Redmart, where consumers can easily find and purchase local produce.

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There are several factors to consider when trying to increase the chances of a successful collaboration within a multi-disciplinary team. Some of these include:

1. Clearly defined goals and objectives: The team should have a clear understanding of what they are trying to achieve, and how their individual contributions will help to meet these goals.

2. Effective communication: Team members should be able to effectively communicate with one another, and be open to different perspectives and ideas.

3. Adequate resources: The team should have access to the resources they need to complete their work, including funding, equipment, and technology.

4. Flexibility: Team members should be open to change and willing to adapt to new ideas or approaches as needed.

5. Trust and respect: Team members should trust and respect one another and should not be afraid of conflicts or honest debates.

6. Clear roles and responsibilities: Each team member should have a clear understanding of their role and what is expected of them, which can help to prevent confusion and ensure that everyone is working together efficiently.

7. Regular meetings and check-ins: Regular meetings and check-ins can help to keep the team on track and ensure that everyone is aware of the progress being made.

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Having local produce farms work with hospitals to feed their patients

Effectiveness:
This method helps increase the usage of local produce being bought and used. However, it might not help in raising awareness as patients usually just take the food and eat it. They are not really keen of knowing more about the ingredients of the food or where it comes from.

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Edible Garden City is a local social enterprise, which runs more than 50 urban food gardens around Singapore, was given a grant by the DBS Foundation in 2017 to ramp up productivity and expand its product range.  People who subscribe to its Citizen Box get a range of soil-grown vegetables, including leafy greens such as mani chye and other produce such as lady's fingers and brinjals.

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Singapore Food Agency has 3 types of certifications, that they place on every packaging of local produce which helps to inform consumers which are locallly grown. Each certifications helps to identify the level of quality of its produce

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Vertical and rooftop farming. These methods are used to tackle the land scarcity that Singapore has, and it has been under application and also is currently still being tested. Most of us now are not a stranger to rooftop gardening or community gardening. Vertical gardening is a method of having a vertically stacked groups of vegetables that are grown usually indoors using hydroponics and artificial lighting. Rooftop gardening has been improving and they are usually farmed using soil.

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Objective: To find out the unique selling points of locally grown produce from the providers' perspective.

Things to Find Out: Most popular produce being sold, Process of preparing produce for selling, Locations or clients where produce are sold, Challenges when relating to target audience, Challenges in operations to provide local produce, Benefits of local versus imported produce

Target Participants: Persons involved with processes in local farms (ACE Pte Ltd, Jurong Frog Farm, Bollywood Farms Pte Ltd)

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(Research Goals)
To understand how Singaporeans view locally sourced produce and their thoughts on it

(Project Goals)
Raise awareness of Singaporeans on the benefits of local farms and how they will allow Singapore to be more independent in terms of food security. As well as to encourage communities to buy and support local produce.

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Current Method 1:
This method is effective to an extent. It is effective because people get to understand and learn about local produce from the sellers at SGFM and they can get local produce conveniently through online without the need to go to the supermarket, this would encourage them to support local produce. Though the event took place, it only drew attention of those interested in agriculture. It is a shame, as not a lot of youths attended the event. The event was not marketed/promoted through social media and because of that, they weren't able to draw youths as part of the audience.

Current Method 2:
Effective at an extent. Not all Singaporean know of Edible Garden City. It is not marketed so publicly that people are aware of this enterprise. It is effective as it does touch on how we can encourage Singaporeans to support local produces but making them to subscribe to its Citizen Box to receive locally produced vegetables. What they can do is to publicise this brand more to ensure that not only a certain group of audience is aware of this and to push for a wider range of people to support these produces. It can be done through social marketing, more public workshops that can happen at neighbouring estates such as Kampong Admiralty for example to educate people of supporting local produces in an interactive way.

Current Method 3:
To an extent, it is effective. It is able to catch the consumer's attention as it is clearly labeled and identified on every local produce packaging. But there are still other factors that is driving away consumers from buying local produce, such as price comparison with imported produce.

Current Method 4:
It is effective. This method was used by a company called go grace where they use four floors of gardening and it produces 10- 20 times more produce per square meter when compared to basic soil planting and it also ensures that extreme weathers and other crop destroying factors like drought or heavy rain does not affect the planting at any time. It also is very cost effective when done in a huge scale and is usually profitable.

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Group of people who works towards a shared objective even though we have different skills. Each member should be contributing to their own strength if the work requires different functions and specialties.

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What should we take into consideration to increase the chances of a successful collaboration? 

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What should we take into consideration to increase the chances of a successful collaboration? 

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To increase the chances of a successful collaboration, we can:

1. Clearly state the project's aims and objectives so that everyone is aware of their responsibilities and what to expect.

2. Encourage open communication amongst team members by setting up a chat.

3. Establish each person's tasks and responsibilities.

4. Encourage an open/welcoming environment on ideas.

5. Getting to know about each team members' strengths, and allocating roles and responsibilities accordingly.

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Understanding the reasons that prevents Foreigners when assimilating into Singapore society?
- Separated by language & culture barriers.
- Foreigners found it hard to understand local jargons and slangs in Singapore (eg. Singlish)
- Foreigners are still emotionally attached to their home countries, and they need time to realise and accept Singapore's cultures and ways of life
- Excluded by locals
- Felt that understanding and assimilating into Singapore is not relevant to their goals (eg. working in Singapore)

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Objectives: To find out the reason for the lack of connection between the foreigners and the locals

Things to find out:

-How are the foreign workers and Singaporeans interacting?

-What are the common activities, events or items do they both interact on frequently

-Are the foreigners putting in efforts to interact with the locals?

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Identify the target group that we want to focus on (Foreigners)​

Identify relevant stakeholders (Government, MFA, Social Workers, Foreigners, Singaporeans)​

Gain relevant Insights through research (Interviews and Shadowing)​

We want to create a bridge between foreigners and Singaporeans. To enable them to connect and understand one another more meaningfully. ​

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Current Method: National Integration Council ​

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What is it about: Firstly, the NIC was set up in April 2009. The NIC's main aim was to bridge the gap between the foreigners and the Singaporeans. Some of their goals is to educate the newcomers (Immigrants) about the Singaporean cultures and social norm. To do this, they distributed handbooks at major touchpoints such as ICA to educate the foreigners. Furthermore, NIC also introduced the Singapore Citizen Journey in 2011 which aimed to deepen the foreigners coming into Singapore about the history and language. ​

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Is it effective: The above initiatives are effective to a certain extent. For instance, educating foreigners about Singapore before they fully integrate is a great way to start their journey in Singapore. Most foreigners come with minimal knowledge of Singapore's history and general culture. ​

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Thus, education is certainly effective. However, after learning about Singapore's social culture and passing the test given, there is no guarantee that foreigners may actually pay any attention to it after they have received their citizenship successfully. Thus, the method of education may only work so far. ​

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Current Method: Through organizing festive events and having special cultural occasions at where the vast majority of foreigners are located at. ​

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What is it about: Singapore has been practicing festive events of one another's culture together in common spaces. In fact,  in 2022, Chinese new year was celebrated with migrant workers located at Penjuru Recreation Centre. The migrant workers tried and ate CNY related traditional foods and as well as played games together with the Singaporeans. ​

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Is it effective: In my opinion, this is a very effective method. Introducing a foreigner to Singapore's culture through such festive events and foods can create a very positive impression on them. They will be more motivated and enthusiastic to try out the different games and foods. While having fun at the same time, they will also be able to gain so much more knowledge about the different cultures in Singapore and what they would do on their respective festive events. ​

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Current Method: The many religions in Singapore co-exist in harmony​

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What is it about: Singapore is the most religiously diverse country in the world, according to a 2014 Pew Research Center study. People can find different places of worship based on their religion. Such as temples, mosques, church, and synagogues​

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Is it effective: I would say that this method is quite effective. For people who are religious, one of the things they considered before coming to a foreign country would be the location to do their prayer. Having a specific religious temple would make them feel more inclusive.​

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Current Method: Our ‘local food’ comes from around the world​

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What is it about: Singapore has a diversity of food, and people can find a variety of food in the shopping mall. For hawker centers, to ensure that everyone can have their food choice they sell at least 3/4 of different cuisines.​

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Is it effective: It is effective for foreigners that just arrived in Singapore. They haven't adapted to the local food culture and would like to have a taste of their hometown food. Allow them to feel included and doesn't feel left out.​

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Is a unit of professionals who specialize in varied fields and are working together. A multidisciplinary team may come across with multiple clients/users, but each users receives individualized attention from each team member. It provides stakeholders and users a platform for them to raise their thoughts from the start till the end of a process. ​

The key things that come with a multi-disciplinary team is that​

Everyone has a say. Team members will play a crucial role by providing input from the start.​

Team members can work together and have their skills complement one another concurrently on the same part of the design.​

The responsibility lies with everyone involved in the team.​

In a multi-disciplinary team,​

Caters to user-centred design ​

Have data and testing to guide​

Prioritizes on the end-to-end experience​

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- Education

Raising awareness via skits, freebies, promotional materials, and so on., in educational institutes like primary schools, secondary schools, and other institutes of higher learning.

- Certification

Just like the healthier choice logo, there is a certification symbol that goes on local produce to let the public know about that the product is grown in Singapore. This is to encourage the support of locally grown produce, and increase awareness of the availability of local produce.

- Singapore's Food Farms

Fisheries

Livestock (meat, poultry, and so on)

Dairy

Eggs

Vegetables

- Urban Farming

vertical/horizontal farming

Aquaponics, Hydroponics

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- Education

It has been quite effective in promoting the consumption of local produce in Singapore as compared to other methods.

Education is generally backed by the government, and NGOs. We can learn about the benefits of consuming local produce. This might convince individuals to choose local produce over imported options as the parents.

Promotional materials such as skits and freebies can also be effective in catching the attention as they are a more interactive and engaging method when compared to social media advertisements.

However, social media is also effective in conveying the message to a large population.

- Certification

This is neither extremely effective or non-effective. But it is able to increase awareness of and support for local produce in Singapore.

The certification symbol on locally grown produce helps consumers easily identify and choose local products, which in turn supports the local agriculture industry.

This can also help increase consumer confidence in locally produced products, as they are certified as meeting certain quality standards.

However, it is not noticed by many, and the majority would prefer familiar brands like pasar from malaysia.

- Singapore's Food Farms

In regards to the supermarket availability, it is effective in providing a wide variety of fresh and high-quality local produce to consumers in Singapore.

The farms produce a wide variety of products including fisheries, livestock, dairy, eggs and vegetables, which are available to consumers.

However, Singapore's land is limited, so the yield may not be as high as other places, and to some the taste is not the same.

- Urban Farming

This is quite well known, and has proven to be effective in Singapore as it allows for efficient use of limited land resources.

Vertical and horizontal farming, as well as aquaponics and hydroponics, are all methods that are being used in Singapore to produce fresh produce in an urban environment.

Also, DIY is very possible.

However, there are still challenges such as cost and maintenance to overcome, and more research and development is needed to improve the productivity of urban farming systems.

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A multi-disciplinary team refers to a team of digital specialists that can allow the creation of services quickly and iteratively. They are used as it gives the users and stakeholders a louder voice from the start of the process. It also refers to a team of people with different sets of unique skills and specialties

What should we take into consideration to increase the chances of a successful collaboration

We should ensure that we always put users at the heart of our designs (user-centric design).

We should ensure that we are able to communicate effectively to prevent miscommunication, this means setting up clear channels of communication such as creating a group on Microsoft teams for example.

We also use skills unique to ourselves to help support one another to ensure a collaborative and effective team

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E-commerce platforms promoting consumers to buy local produce

Effectiveness:
This method is quite effective as groceries are now moving to online purchases. With such initiatives, it helps consumers to be aware of local produce and click it to purchase it. It uses large text and point forms to inform them about the benefits and basically giving more awareness to local produce.

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Global:

Education:
In Schools:

Provide hands on activities where students are taught to plant and grow, cook vegetables that they grow.

Local farm partner with school to provide food resources to the school

Lessons about gardening

Exhibition:

There’s exhibition to raise the awareness of food insecurity, provide information about what can be done to stop food insecurity

Social Media:

Spread awareness using social media platform like TikTok, Instagram, etc to promote about local produce

Partnerships between local farms and businesses : Local farms supply local produce to hospitals to cater to patients and staff.

Singapore:

Education

In Schools:

Paper craft activities to learn about the types of produce

Give plant starter kit for students to learn and experience the difficulties of growing plants, for them to learn how to appreciate food.

School Talks:

To raise awareness on initiatives, current issues faced and types of local produce.

Mobile Exhibitions:

A set of display columns which provide information on food security and food safety issues, and learn how Singapore is making use of such issues to ensure safe and secure food for all. These columns  can be set up and displayed at any location without charge, assuming they are still available.

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What is a multi-disciplinary team? What do we consider to increase chances of a successful collab?

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What is a multi-disciplinary team? What do we consider to increase chances of a successful collab?

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A multi-disciplinary team is a group of specialists from different fields with different strengths that work together. By working together, the team is able to build services quickly.

Things to consider to increase chances of a successful collab would be:

- Having a clear objective for the project so that everyone is aware and on the same page.

- Communicate effectively and openly to prevent miscommunications.

- Avoid power dynamics. Make it clear that everyone is equal and there is a need for teamwork and collaboration, no individual should take control of the whole team.

- Assigning responsibilities to each member so that the team can stay on task and everyone is equally involved in the project.

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improvements:
1. having partners is important for the price of the vegetables (eg giving vouchers)
2. location to bring convenience to consumers
3. scan QR code to exchange points

consideration:
1. are these Point Of Sales (POS) labels problematic?

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Objective: To find out more about the challenges the foreigners face while integrating into Singapore. ​

Research Method: Semi-Structured Interview​

Rationale: Conducting an interview will allow my team to gain qualitative insights which will help us to understand the possible challenges that foreigners face and what are their thoughts and opinions. Semi-structured allows us to have some level of flexibility in asking follow up questions to understand more about their response. ​

Target Participant(s): Foreigners who are working in Singapore​

Screener Question:​

1. Are you a local?​

2. Are you currently working in Singapore?

Questions:
What is your overall experience in Singapore? ​

Do you think you are adapting well to Singapore's culture​​

Have you been to any local events/workshops organized specially to help you integrate into Singapore? ​​If yes, why? If no, why not?

Apart work, what made you come to Singapore?​

What do you generally do in your free time?​